incubator-couchdb-user mailing list archives

Hello,
We need to periodically need to compact our database.
The problem is that this takes many hours and we cannot stay offline
for so long.
Instead we could replicate the database into a new instance and
switchover, as replication is much faster.
The question however is if both produces the same result.
Will a compacted database be the same as a replicated one?
If not, what are the differences? Which one performs better?
Any other solution to the problem of having to compact but cannot stay
offline for as lon as the compaction takes?
Thanks!
Boaz